597 



Controlled fusion is the subject of one of the working groups 

 established in 1982 by decision of the Heads of State and Government 

 at the Versailles meeting of the Summit of Industrialized Nations. 

 The Heads of State have subsequently endorsed the activities of the 

 working groups. The fusion working group has identified the 

 importance and magnitude of the effort of developing fusion and has 

 concluded that a substantial increase in international cooperation is 

 justified. 



The extent to which any national or multinational fusion program 

 will be willing to rely on international cooperation rather than its 

 own strength and direction is a policy issue, the resolution of which 

 may place constraints upon such cooperation. 



Thus the main incentives for increased international cooperation 

 are the expectation of enhanced technical results, probable cumulative 

 savings — through sharing of costs and risks — in human and financial 

 resources compared to those required by a separate program, and 

 long-run merit as seen at the heads-of-state level. The main 

 hesitancy will center on the possibility of weakening the individual 

 programs, but conditions can be set to maintain the desired vigor. 

 For these reasons, we come to the following conclusion: 



o On balance, there are substantial potential benefits of 



large-scale international collaboration in the development of 

 fusion energy . 



FACTORS AFFECTING THE IMPLEMENTATION OF 

 INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION 



There are many technical, political, institutional, and other factors 

 that define the context within which the possibilities for increased 

 levels of international cooperation in fusion must be explored. Some 

 of these factors are favorable and some tend to be constraining. 



Fusion power plants are at least a few decades from 

 commercialization. This time horizon provides a unique opportunity 

 for cooperation over the next decade or two with little compromise of 

 the competitive position that national industries might seek to create 

 in a commercial fusion market of the future. As that time approaches, 

 it should be possible to accommodate proprietary objectives by an 

 orderly disengagement or by other measures commonly employed in 

 today's technological industries. 



The points made previously concerning the approximate parity in the 

 status of the world programs, their similarity in objectives, the 

 gathering momentum of the EC and Japanese programs, the existence of 

 technical needs and opportunities, political and administrative 

 receptivity, and the absence of near-term competition in the 

 srcialization of fusion support the following conclusion: 



A window in time for large-scale collalaoration is now open . 



